The 2019 Samsung Notebook Odyssey is a Powerhouse with a Hefty Price Tag

The 2019 Samsung Notebook Odyssey is a Powerhouse with a Hefty Price Tag

Ali Bokhari

May 23, 2019

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When you’re out looking for gaming laptops, Samsung isn’t exactly a brand you would consider going for. In fact, Samsung doesn’t even make dedicated gaming laptops, well until earlier this year at least. At CES 2019, Samsung revealed what was a successor to it’s first ever attempt at a gaming laptop. It’s called the Notebook Odyssey and you can buy it now.

Apart from having a cool name, the Notebook Odyssey does seem to be a promising entrant in the world of gaming laptops. However, it will face competition from the likes of Alienware, Asus, and even Lenovo. Let’s see how it compares.

Design

Image: Samsung

Looks-wise, I’d have to say, the Notebook Odyssey certainly looks unique. Probably the most notable design feature is the hinge and lid situation. The lid of this laptop is hinged, like most laptops. However, unlike most laptops, the hinge doesn’t go all the way to the edges, making it quite narrow. Add that to the fact that the hinge goes up a few inches before the lid starts and you’ve got yourself an interesting looking laptop.

Some may find it unconventional and it might put them off from buying this machine. However, I think it looks good in its own fashion. Also, dare I say it, it looks a small desktop with the screen several inches above the keyboard. With that out of the way, the rest seems to be a typical gaming laptop design.

Image: Samsung

You get a nice keyboard with a good feel and travel. It also has a red backlight to give it a more gaming laptop look, though I would’ve preferred an RGB one. Up front, you have a 15.6″ display that has decent bezels but a huge chin (owing to the elongated hinge). You do get an exposed HD webcam above the display that’s decent at best.

Coming to the back, you get huge cooling vents that look similar to the Lenovo Leigon Y740, though they’re not as abysmal. On top of the lid, you get a subtle Odyssey logo instead of Samsung, embedded in the surface. Unfortunately, the Notebook Odyssey is only available in a matt black color. But it, combined with the red backlit keyboard, sure looks badass.

Performance

Image: Samsung

Powering the Notebook Odyssey is an 8th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-8750H CPU along with a 6GB NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 2060 GPU. Even if you don’t know much about gaming laptops, you’d know that this is, undoubtedly, a killer combination. In addition to that, you get a 16 GB 2400 MHz DDR4 RAM and a 512 GB PCIe SSD storage. If you ask me, the Notebook Odyssey could do with more memory and storage as it lags behind the competition in this regard.

The 15.6″ display we talked about earlier, is an Anti-Glare 1920×1080 FHD LED panel. It refreshes up to 144 Hz, gets up to 300 nits of brightness and comes standard with NVIDIA® G-Sync. Needless to say, the content viewing experience on the Notebook won’t definitely disappoint you even though it lacks a 4K resolution option.

As far as battery life is concerned, you get a 4-cell 54Wh Li-ion battery, which seems to be decent at best. It’s better than regular laptops but isn’t on par with its rivals. However, something that it does better than its competitors is that it has built-in support for Virtual and Mixed Reality. This is thanks to the inclusion of the Samsung HMD Odyssey+ Mixed Reality headset that you can optionally pre-order with the laptop.

Connectivity

Image: Samsung

As far as I/O goes, the Odyssey has got you covered. It comes with 3 USB 3.0, 1 USB-C (non-thunderbolt), a 3.5mmHeadphone Jack, and an HDMI out. This may not seem much but it’s everything you need. To be honest I’m a bit disappointed on the USB-C port not being thunderbolt though. Other than that, you do get an 802.11 ac wave2 WiFi and Bluetooth v5.0 adapters.

Price & Verdict

Since there’s only one fixed configuration for the Notebook Odyssey, the price is fixed as well. You can pre-order it for $1999 from here. As I’ve mentioned earlier, if you want, you can also get an HMD Odyssey+ Mixed Reality headset for VR and MR gaming experience for an additional $499.

Now, the Notebook Odyssey may have some impressive specs but it’s not worth the price tag. For $1999 you’re just getting a 15″ Full HD screen with only 16GB RAM, 512GB storage and a mediocre battery. I’d recommend going for the Lenovo Leigon Y740, where at a similar price, you’re getting more screen, better battery, and more memory and storage options.

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